Menopause Matters Forum
Menopause Discussion => All things menopause => Topic started by: prestige on February 15, 2019, 11:04:00 AM
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Ladies,
Since my "wonderful" memopause journey, I have been stripped of many things. As the memopause for me has been both physical and mental, I almost go through life now without "shock absobers". I use this analagy because prior to the menopause, I had great resilience to whatever life threw at me. I was definitely a person that coped and got on with things.
Now, I worry about the slightest thing.Whether its a health issue that concerns me, or any other family member. A small worry that pops in ito my mind quickly turns in to a major catastrophe within seconds. Thank God none of them ever come true, but it does not stop me from stressing about it. All rational thoughts go out the window and it takes all my willpower to STOP the stupid thoughts popping back up again.
It then sends my anxiety through the roof. The anxiety and stress then zap up my energy, which in turn makes me feel tired :'(
I never knew in a million years how detrimental to my life the menopause effect would have on my life. I laughably thought it was a few hot flushes and that would be it done and dusted. If I did, I would definitely have drank, smoked and lived life at a much faster pace (if you get my drift) then I have ;D
I'm lucky that I have an understanding husband and children - although I'm not entirely convinced how much they truely understand.
Thank you for listening to my rant.
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You'l in good Company here ;)
Maybe make a diary: mood/symptoms/food : to chart how you are. Also, making a list each evening and ticking off chores next day reassures you of what you achieve. Any chores not ticked go onto the next list. Simples ;)
I forget names of people ......... and where we went yesterday even though I know that I've enjoyed it ::)
At our age we are often juggling: ageing parents, retirement, children/exams., health issues: give yourself some breathing space! Learn to delegate ;)
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The meno certainly does have a lot to answer for. It is great to have this forum to laugh, cry and rant on when we need to with judgement
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Hello Prestige. I can sympathise and empathise with everything you have written. My anxiety is quite dreadful. I'm coping using everything except HRT and AD's but I'm on the edge a lot of the time. During each month (I'm perimenopausal) I'm up and down all the time. Health anxiety about myself and all my loved ones is pretty out of control. If it's not one thing, it's something else. I couldn't agree more with what you say about having no idea the detrimental effect this would have on your life. Actually, I think it's better we didn't know that this shit was coming!!! What I hate most is the peaks and troughs. Woke up quite happy and then late morning, fear came and sat on my shoulder. Now I'm jittery, feeling sick and worrying I'm dying of today's ailment...What are you using to cope?
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Appropriate anti-anxiety medication works for me. Without Propranolol and anti-anxiety emergency tablet, I wouuldn\t be here!
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Ladies - thank you so much for taking the time to respond.
I know this sounds a bit obvious, but my way of coping is just taking a day at a time. I have tried to keep away from social media and Dr Google as much as possible.I know deep down those two things are just not good for my mental health. I try and listen to some calming music and do some sort of medidation. Although, I'm absolutely useless at it ;D My mind just keeps wandering off.......
This menopause journey is a blooming rollercoaster. Its the first time I have no control over my body or mind, so consequently I go in to anxiety mode. On top of all this, my GP is next to useless and everyone in my social circle seems to have gone through the menopause with the least amount of discomfort or perhaps admit to others. I then start thinking; OK are my symptoms menopausal?....why I'm I the only one feeling like this?? Am I suffering from some other disease I have not diagnosed yet? Hence the vicious cycle begins.
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So why not explore appropriate medication to help anxiety :-\ ........
I try not to look more than half a day at a time or anxiety can rise :o
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Hi Prestige,
Your post really struck a chord with me. I particularly like your description of living life without shock absorbers as that is exactly how I feel. I say that I feel that I am walking a tightrope and the smallest thing can cause me to fall. I too miss the old me who took everything in her stride. I am hoping that this is a phase and I will grow in to a new way of being.
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Hi prestige and everyone else
I can honestly say I lost my forties due to the menopause I tell people it ruined my life
Unbearable physically and mentally driving me to be under the care of the community mental health team for awhile and onoff anti depressants for even longer
Having a hysterectomy helped with all my symptoms so much. I still have days with low mood and anxiety but nothing like before.
Be kind to yourselves
Xx
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Oh isn't the menopause fun ladies?once strong women,we now stress our way through life,thinking that every little twinge is going to be the end of us.like you prestige, I take one day at a time and if it's a good day, I enjoy every second of it.you're in the right place here,get whatever you want off your chest,there's no taboos 😊
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Actually as I aged I got more Bolshie ;D - I now put up with no crap at all ;)
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Yes I'm the same.
Nothing EVER bothered me, I coped with everything life threw at me,
and most days I still do now that I'm on hrt, by my god, what a wreck I was, most of the meno symptoms, and feeling so ill, I thought I was going mad!....or going to die, horrendous journey...
I still have bad days, but nowhere near as bad as before, so I think this IS THE best I'm ever going to get, I'm still over analysing things, and my brain over reactes , and those days I just want to stay in, but I suppose distractions help me, so I make myself do things, but I'm only able to with the help of hrt, without that, I don't know where I'd be today.
I've found that I can be more bolshie, a little bit anyway, I was never like that before, but now I'm more...stubborn, if the need arises, instead of a push over.....so it has changed me, maybe for the better in that case anyway.....
Xx
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Sounds familiar. I have always struggled with OCD type anxiety which receded in my thirties and early forties and has now returned. It's very uncomfortable; I feel on edge, worried about my health and events (real and imagined) from my past
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Hi prestige
You rant away! That's what this forum is here for....
Yes the menopause has a lot to answer for - like you I thought it was end of periods, a few hot flushes and bingo - all done and back to normal ::) !
What was your question?
Hurdity x
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Oh yes Rosepetal,
Events from my past haunt me too!
They creep in every so often, and it takes days n days for them to settle. WHY?
I can't understand it, I wish I'd have done things a bit differently, but who doesn't, somewhere along the way, but I also know the past IS the past, we can't go back and change things, we can and probably have learnt a lot by them though, and I can do what I have to do now by that knowledge, in events that happen to me now. BUT, I just wish those ghosts would go away, and stay dead.....
Hopefully, one day when all this meno stuff is over, if it ever does, our minds will be more settled..
Until then, some days are still a battle..xx
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Psychologically I don't feel ‘safe' :-\
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I am definitely suffering with “my nerves†::)
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Hi Prestige sorry to hear you are struggling.
I can empathise with a little of what you've said. I have struggled emotionally for years due to a difficult childhood, this only exacerbated when I began perimenopause.......the negative and destructive thoughts, worry about everything and anxiety. Due to my childhood difficulties I was accustomed to keeping everything inside and trying to deny the bad feelings. It's not a good idea to quosh them. It wastes valuable energy. I have learned to acknowledge bad thoughts worries etc, I note that they are there when they happen. I'd say to myself ok it's this again and try to let it pass. A walk, an appreciation of a nice view, a chocolate biccie something to distract and become mindful helps in the aftermath. I don't know if I'm explaining this very well sorry. I use Headspace to help with the mindfulness, and yoga has had a calming effect and is obviously good for your body. A bit of me time. The bad thoughts are not more likely to come true because you acknowledge them but you are more likely to be able to deal with them and have more energy to enjoy nicer things.
Also the advice about delegating is so true. I'm a bit of a control freak but in a nice helpful way. I end up doing too much for the family that they should do themselves. So I recently stopped doing so much and I find it quite liberating. Allow more me time for yourself.
Hope this is helpful xx
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Rosepetal - is your GP aware? I understand that, I would wander to our Surgery and sit for a while so that I didn't do anything to myself. Sometimes they would give me a cup of tea ........
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CLKD - thank you for your concern. This is a familiar (although uncomfortable) feeling very similar to PND. It will pass, it always does :)
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Do you have support at home Rosepetal? Does knowing that it passes help how you feel?
So many questions ::)
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I do have support at home :) my husband and son are very understanding and when I'm having a particularly bad week I put a blue cat magnet on the fridge so I get extra offers of tea and they know not to ask too much of me ;D
It does help to know it passes but sometimes the change in mood can still take me by surprise and it takes me a little while to get my coping skills together ::)
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Phew! Love the idea of the fridge magnet - I wonder if mine would even notice the warnings :D
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I must admit most what most of you ladies are going through i recognise. The anxiety is through the roof some days, worry about family like nobodies business, my mind is constantly on the go and some days i feel totally exhausted. Health anxieties go from one to the next. I also feel i have some underlying condition that is simmering away. There is not a day goes past when i don't feel something and then the mind blows it all out of proportion. Like CKLD i don't put up with any crap now, i also don't care if anyone likes me, i am at that stage in life that i can't be bothered with their drama's, it's their loss ;D
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Brilliant jgr,you're so right,I've been there for everybody in my family for yeeears,yet nobody said,hey,how are you'so when I moved hundreds of miles from them to Wiltshire it's gradually stopped and it's great not listening to all their rubbish,don't get me wrong I'd always be there if someone needed me but I've enough of my own issues,the only difference is I keep them private and deal with them by myself,pity rest of my family wasn't like that 🤨
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Psychologically I don't feel ‘safe' :-\
That is SO familiar - I've said it myself numerous times since this all started. I have well and truly fallen apart, anxiety and depression always lurking, and so far HRT isn't helping. I lost my job because I'd been off for so long, have had numerous visits from the Crisis Team, now under COmmunity Mental Health and waiting for an appointment with a clinical psychologist. It's no exaggeration to say that the menopause has destroyed my life, and I really sympathise with everyone else in this horrible situation...
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Hi Countrygirl.
I know what you're going through, these thoughts go round n round, they drive me mad sometimes,
but when I get to that stage, I HAVE to put a stop to them, else I would go mad!
I have to do something, anything, to get my mind off them, ANYTHING, to shake em off.
This works for me, yeah, they come back, but that distraction helps to put me back on an even keel, if you see what I mean....don't let them take over, you've learnt from them, now take that knowledge and use it to handle things that happen now. That's what I do, there are some ‘ghosts' that I don't see anymore, even though they're still in my head, the people that caused them, so I'm happy about that, I was always there for them, them not for me, but there are some that I still do see, and now I handle them by keeping them at arms length, it's my coping mechanism, and I think, you know what, you've caused me so many issues, I don't care anymore, I am your loss, NOT the other way around, so stick that where the sun don't shine! Lol.
I know some people are probably saying, I didn't think she was like that, well, no I wasn't like that, it's how you've made me, at the time I didn't realise, but now I do, I absolutely hate, people who jump onto someone's weak spot and trample all over it, I allowed that to happen to me, but now I've wised up, it's took a while, lol, and now I'm not there for them, I'm not there for them to jump on me anymore... it's hard, but this meno thing has wised me up, take what you've learnt, and use it positively.... jeeze, don't I go on........, I'm glad I've helped you, slow your thoughts, and pick at each one as they pop up....and take the knowledge from it.......xxxx😘
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I recognise all these feelings and it's exhausting! Hope I feel "normal" again one day!
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We all have ghosts of the past,I have too many to mention, I try to tell myself that there's nothing you can do about it,they're history but it's hard at times.
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Countrygirl, I've seen a lot written about menopause being the time in your life when ghosts of the past come back to haunt you - it makes sense, as it's a natural point when you pause and take stock because everything is changing and you don't know what's coming next. If you have children they're probably leaving the nest, if you don't you may be dealing with regrets about that, and either way we're all dealing with grief about the loss of our youth and the opportunities and idealism that went with it. Maybe a good time for some therapy/counselling if you can afford it?
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Yes Racjen,
Therapy does sound like a good idea.
Getting it out helps enormously. I've never had therapy, but I suppose talking to my OH counts as that, and I've probably sent him round the twist for it, but if you haven't anyone to talk to, writing it all down helps too. I've done that, the amount of paperwork I've shredded in the past is unreal. Xx
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I had intermittent talking therapy for 3/4 years in the 1990s. Venting really helped and now I can't remember why I went to the sessions ::). Discuss, decide, ditch.
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You sound like me Birdy,parents couldn't care less about me,looked after myself my whole life,only now that I'm married to a wonderful man that I've let ANYONE in.low self esteem,no confidence but I do get along with people but at arms length. I think most of us have dark thoughts,most of us are way over half our lives,life is cruel and short but I always think that I've had it way better than some and I try to be grateful for that
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Not a stupid question at all! Bad parenting is so disappointing for children. The feeling of not being wanted, loved, cared for can be devastating. Children need warmth, food, cuddles; to be noticed. Valued.
My parents argued. [long story short]. My sister is my Mother's favourite child. But I understand it more now. Also, having talked to a favourite aunt 5 years ago, I found out that my hidden memories were real and not imagined. It validated mine [and her own] feelings about certain events.
You recognise why you feel like you do. What does your partner suggest? Could you write a letter to your parents, in order to vent your feelings? It won't be posted but it gets it in front of you. Then you can break down the salient points.
What have you achieved over the years? Schooling? Friendships? Reading, writing, sums ..... (I still can't do adding up etc. ::) ).
Work commitments? You could use your creativity to build a good basic wardrobe. You come over really well in your posts on here! Your creativity could become a hobby ;)
Do you not take care of yourself so that you disappear from your surroundings? Your partner presumably cares so perhaps talking this over would be a starting point? Make lists. Things that are good on a daily basis as well as things that you avoid. I love making lists ;-).
Make lists too about what you would like to do - if you didn't have anxiety and if you felt better about yourself.
Anxiety: for me it's intenseness naseua with the fear of being sick or seeing someone else ill. I avoided pubs at chucking out times from an early age. I don't go near anyone if they even look as though they will cough :o. It starts near my belly button, weakness goes into my thighs, into my calves and then I'm curled into a ball. Shaking violently. The emergency pills saves my Life! Even though I know that anxiety is a saving grace it overhwelms me ...... with anxiety we wouldn't stop at the kerb for example which would be really messy ;) ::).
I don't cook. I have a husband who enjoys it. He has to cook for himself so makes double ........ some is frozen so we have quick meals for when I get suddenly hungry.
I think it is natural to wonder about end of life etc.. But if we have a good support system, a good GP and Dentist, these things go back into context. I have all these issues, last thing at night ......... but in the day, because I can keep busy, they are less of a problem.
Talking therapy really helped. Discuss, decide, ditch. Our history defines us of course, because it's what makes us who we turn out to be. However, if you realise that it wasn't your fault: for example, how were your parents treated whilst growing up? I know that had I produced children that I would have parented the same way as my parents shouted, controlled, didn't listen - instead of treating a child as a small person! I would be a better Mum now than in my 20s ::)
Make that list! Go through your wardrobe to see what you own. How your pieces would fit into your daily life-style should you want to go for a walk, into town for shopping, into the garden to sit or do some weeding. Would going to a beauty counter for a make-over help? if not now, at a later date? Getting nails done?
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Not really Birdy, I like to walk dogs though,you?
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I chose a man un-like my parents ;-). Someone who loved me as I am, not as they wanted me to be!! Accepted me as I have turned out to be, including the anorexia, depression, anxiety which made me housebound.
I also made up my mind that as far as possible, I wouldn't shout to get my own way or to make him do what I wanted. It took a LOT of practice!!
My parents didn't have a TV. We read. Played board games. Walked a lot. Everything was done because my parents wanted to do things as well as my having ballet and music lessons. Not my choices but hey ho! Mum made cut out and ready to sew dresses for us. Dad mended toys. We had cycles, roller skates, scooters ........ but were only allowed to go up and down the path outside the house so that we 'didn't bother' anyone! So a lot of control went on.
We both had hobbies whilst growing up. Some we carried though to being married and now: fishing, walking, gardening; reading, pen-friends [me], TV although we watch different programmes ::) - stamp collecting and board games when we first married as we couldn't afford a TV. (Long B4 computers and internet were even though about). We still have our Amstrad record player ;D.
I don't do sewing but he can if pushed. I don't do cooking - but he does ;-).
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It's difficult,especially for husbands etc,I can't believe sometimes he loves me,almost because I don't deserve to be loved,ive never loved anyone til I met him and I was 48 by then,just couldn't allow anyone close.my daughter and I are like best friends rather than mum and daughter.when I'm ill, I want to be left alone as that's how ive done it my whole life,never had a mother who “was there “ but I'm happier now than I've ever been,ive at long last got a nice life
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So you need a good cry! Maybe you need to mourn your childhood? The feeling that you weren't cared for, not loved, not appreciated! We all need validation.
Make that list? Forcing yourself onto cycling might not help the anxiety. Exercise should eventually refocus any anxiety into what you are doing. When really depressed I was unable to stay in the bath: I had to get in, wash quickly and get out - there's an expression for such restlessness but I can't remember ::) : agitated? : I couldn't concentrate on a book, TV, magazine. My brain was dashing too much. Medication really has helped.
Yoga can be good. Swimming. Anything that re-focuses the mind which does take practice which is why talking therapy may help ease your feelings. How much is your OH aware?
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I think that honest discussion with partners is essential. We must never assume that we know how anyone else is feeling. We must never assume therefore, that we know how anyone is feeling about our often perceived inadequacies! Mine told me years ago "I'm not a mind reader you know" as well as "Do not assume that I am angry or disappointed when X, Y, Z happens". "It is what it is" seems to be his mantra.
Also we are not responsbile for how others feel about what we say or do. People might not like certain aspects of us but unless we go out of R way to be nasty, unkind etc., how they react is up to them ;-).
Little steps.
Accept R as he is. Does he have hobbies that you could join in with? Even a walk every day is a starting point.
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....... and breath! Singing can help enormously as we can't shallow breath whilst singing. Maybe it's a skill that you could cultivate? What are you taking for the anxiety?
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Do you take the beta-blocka, those are designed to slow down the heart rate.
Dizapam Valium - which dosage? I had 10mg x 3 for several months then 10mg as necessary then down to 5mg as necessary. I used them the evening prior to an event I wasn't able to avoid. His mother hated that I fell asleep in t he afternoons on our visits to see her but I told her "Without them you wouldn't ever see your Son" ;). She would wait until I was dropping off then, "Did you have an early start this morning?" - as we had already discussed our start time she already knew. Or "You will get a stiff neck if you fall asleep there". Didn't stop me ;D
Which AD has been suggested? If not those, why not try yoga, singing, dancing ;). Closing the curtains first, maybe :D